Ken Chaffin has released both the WebHAMR plugin and standalone HAMR Viewer into Alpha today for testing!!!

Information and download info for the Web plugin can be found here: http://www.hash.com/hamr

You will need v13.0h or higher to create HAMR content. More info about creating content can be found in the above web link.

Standalone HAMR Viewer: HA:MR Viewer Installer[5m]

Have fun & please report any issues to A:M Reports (there are two new reporting categories: "WebHAMR Plugin" & "HAMR Viewer")

** WebHAMR plugin installer updated to include the HTML templates mentioned in the Creating Content page.

Brilliant !
Just downloaded and played around on this,works a treat.Only one thing though the Kids Room Hamr - Damn creepy,it's like something out of a twilight zone episode.
Great work.

Jay

Sounds like a great feature. Could it be available for firefox as well?

Oh yeah!

Very cool that the info page does the browser detect thing.
That helped remind me to use IE.

Congrats for the roll out... and thanks especially for releasing it for us to play with over the weekend.

Woo Hoo!

Yeah the browser one is cool. Well done Ken!

Am I missing the link for the standalone one?

Some things I'd like:

Keyboard controls for options like Pageup and PageDown....just like in AM.
Right and middle mouse button support.
The ability to restrict roatation and movment (so your client can't view the back sides of walls or drag balls through walls)
In the far future....collision detection. Even basic stuff for walls.

I'm sure they'll come anyway, but I'll send some reports in just in case.

How do we move around? I loaded the kids room, and when I clicked on the teddy bear, the scene went black, with some traces of lines. So, I went to wireframe to discover I was outside.

How do I get back in??

For those of us who downloaded the plugin before the content template examples were included, would you please make those html template pages available for us to download seperately?
Thanks.

Is it possible to use relative paths, like
CWebHAMRCtrl.LoadModel("files.zip")
or
CWebHAMRCtrl.LoadModel("myModel/files.zip")

That would make it much easier to test the web page before uploading it to a server.

I'm trying it right now and the plugin loads in IE but the loading progress bar is blank and no content is being loaded.

Here they are.

Playing here, we had to use full path to get the content to work off a local drive.

On the black screen, try doing a "f5" or refresh.

(r-click and select save-as on the links below)

If you get totally lost in a project, you can press either the number pad '1' or the keyboard number '1' key to return to the camera view. Many keys behave like they do in A:M if they are applicable to WebHAMR.

This thing is freakin awesome. I just exported a project with two models totalling 5005 patches and three small decals and a simple chor action with the models rotating over 240 frames, and the zip file is only 320KB.

I got it to load a project on my local development web server no problem using absolute paths. When loading the page as a normal file (using the file->open) menu option in IE, I noticed some thngs that may be obvious to some, but I'll say it anyway.
I'm testing on Win2K SP4 and IE 6 SP1.

The file path can't have any spaces in it.
You can't have "D:/my file/testProject.zip".
You have to have something like "D:/my_file/testProject.zip".

You have to use forward slashes in the HTML file. Like CWebHAMRCtrl.LoadModel("D:/test/testproject.zip") instead of D:\test\testproject.zip

You might try replacing the spaces with %20

example: the file is still at "d:/my file/testproject.zip" but reference it with "d:/my%20file/testproject.zip"

Another thing I discovered.
The scroll wheel advances an animation frame by frame. That could be really useful for studying someone's animation. You have to give the slider a little jiggle for it to work.

Also, ctrl-left-mouse-drag tilts the model instead of rotating around it when in turn mode.

When we get
middle-mouse-drag = pan
or spacebar-left-mouse-drag = pan
and
<shift>->left-mouse-drag = zoom

then it will be *really* slick.

OK, I have some rough tests up finally.
http://www.holmesbryant.dreamhosters.com/hamr/figA/
(320KB)
http://www.holmesbryant.dreamhosters.com/hamr/figHIK/
(1.1MB)

For best results, click on the "lock"(fixed patch subdivision) button.
The decals showed fine when I tested the projects on my computer, but they don't seem to show up when viewed over the web.

Impressive Holmes.

Talk about a great way to start demonstrating WebHAMR.
A:M, the classics... new technology... very nice.

Makes me want to go straight back to the drawing board.

Keep posting!
Loving what I see in WebHAMR so far.

Very very nice... I'm gonna play with it now

*Fuchur*

Here at my computer that isnt functional at the Web-Plugin... only with the Standalone-Viewer.
I am using IE 6.0 and HAMR 14.0 Alpha 1 with a prjb-file in a zip. (nothing else)

*Fuchur*

Fuchur,

It sounds like the file name is most likely wrong in your html file. If that is the case, you will see the download progress bar come up and nothing else ever happens. If that is what you are seeing, make sure you have the file name exactly right. I need to change WebHAMR to give a meaningful error message when it can't find the referenced file.

Ken Chaffin- Hash, Inc.

If you mean that pressing the <1> key does not return you to the default view, try going into wireframe mode first, and then press the <1> key.

On my graphics computer the <1> key, and all the numpad keys work in the web viewer, but on my web development computer(PIII 800MHz, 512RAM, W2K SP4), none of the keys work when I'm in shaded mode. I have to switch to wireframe mode first. I figured this was because my computer just couldn't keep up with all the data being processed.


OK, I'm testing it again and none of the number keys are working now, even in wireframe mode. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, the worse kind of problem

OK, testing some more. If I jiggle the animation slider a little, the number keys start working.

The problem you describe sounds to me as if you haven't clicked the mouse in the image area or on the toolbar before trying to use keyboard shortcuts. WebHAMR is an ActiveX plugin and recent Microsoft security changes require that you click on the ActiveX control once in order to activate it. You should see a little yellow message to that effect when WebHAMR begins displaying your data. The reason that clicking on the wireframe button or on the scrub bar control allows you to then use keyboard shortcuts is that by clicking on any button you activate the ActiveX control.

Ken Chaffin- Hash, Inc.

Greg,
Navigating around in WebHAMR takes some getting used to. What probably happened when you clicked on the bear was that you continued moving the mouse with the button down and since the default mode is "turn", the scene rotated around the bear (you should always start your turn with the mouse cursor over the object that you want to be the "focus" or center of rotation) and you were outside. Then when you clicked and moved the mouse again to turn, you probably had another object as the center of rotation and it can get tricky to rotate back into the room. That is the reason that I removed two walls and the ceiling from Yves' KidsRoom project as it was very difficult to get back into the room if you rotated out. As I mentioned in one of my replies, you can press '1' to get back to the camera view, just like in A:M. Another navigation feature that WebHAMR has is that you can use the keyboard arrow keys to move the camera. Up arrow goes forwards, down arrow goes backwards, left and right arrows rotate the camera. These same movements can be performed with the mouse and simultaneous key presses just like in A:M, but the arrow keys are a bit quicker to get to and remember. Just beware that once you move the camera then this becomes the new position and orientation to which pressing '1' will return.

Ken Chaffin, Hash Inc.

Thanks for the reply Ken. I'm testing it again.
Win2K SP4, IE 6 SP1.
I load this page
http://www.holmesbryant.dreamhosters.com/hamr/figA/
and click on the figure and rotate it. That should activate the activeX control? Then I press the number keys but nothing happens in the viewer. The numbers I type, however, are entered in the browser's address bar.

Next I click on the "wireframe mode" button and then try the number keys. The scene doesn't change, but the numbers I type begin appearing in the address bar.

Then I jiggle the animation slider and all the number keys work.

Then I switch to another window or application (the WebHamr viewer window loses focus) and switch back. I click on the model in the viewer and turn it, then try the number keys. Nothing happens, but the numbers I type are entered in the browser address bar. Then I jiggle the animation slider and the number keys work correctly again.

Okay, I was able to reproduce your problem but I'm not sure what is causing it. If I click in the IE address edit box or in my case in my Google search box, any keys pressed go to those boxes and not WebHAMR. I can't get keyboard focus back to WebHAMR even by pressint the Tab key repeatedly. If I click on reload, the data reloads and I can once again keyboard control WebHAMR. What I suspect is that there may be some tool in you IE toolbar that continually resets keyboard focus back to the IE toolbar. Not sure, I'm just guessing. Anyone else have any ideas?

I just now noticed that I too can regain keyboard control by clicking on the scrub bar, no need to jiggle it even. Strange.

Upon further thought, it probably isn't a tool in the toolbar resetting focus but rather WebHAMR just doesn't get focus when activated on your system. I still don't know why that is though. On my system switching task windows and returning to WebHAMR, WebHAMR regains focus as it should.


Ken Chaffin- Hash, Inc.

Hmmm, I don't know Ken. I don't have any add-ons in my IE toolbar. My preferred browser is Firefox, so I leave IE pretty much unmodified and only use it when I have to.

Wow!
I feel like a kid with a new toy...THIS IS GREAT! I'm actually shaking!

Mr. Ken Chaffin! OUTf'nSTANDING!

All I did was look at Holmes art-recreations...I have to play with this some more. I read the 'terms' where Hash outlines some of the possible uses...wow! Very cool models Holmes! I, too am 100% firefox-dependant so I had to go looking for my IE and dust it off... I'm sure a Firefox version is in the plans...as well as basic interactivity...

I need to see a choreography with some action!

This is AWESOME!

Well done Ken!

That works a treat ,just a couple of things ,I can see the two that Will put above but not the ones from the hamer dl site ,and When I hover above some things in the bedroom one say the blind going up it crashes IE
any Idea what Ive got wrong,but its real good edited ,the one from Holmes site don't show either I must have something wrong here

HOW DO IT KNOW?

Let's say I want to publish a choreography as a HAMR file...with camera moves and lots of models etc... How does the .html file I make know to open the .prj and show which files I want to show...? (In this case, just the chor.)

On the other hand...let's say from the same project all I wanted to publish in HAMR was one of the model files...where does HAMR specify which to publish???

When WebHAMR unzips the file, it looks at the content files and first tries to find a PRJ file or PRJB file and load it. If it doesn't find a project file, it looks to see if there is a MDL file and loads it if so. In the later case it also looks to see if there is an ACT file to load with the MDL and does so if there is.

For a project file, the first Chor found in the project is the only one renderable. Currently there is no support for loading a CHO file seperately from a project file.

Ken Chaffin- Hash, Inc.

When you hover over the blinds a sound normally plays. Maybe WebHAMR is crashing when it tries to play a sound. Do you get any sounds to play? In order to better understand what may be happening, do you own and are you able to run Animation:Master on your machine? If so, are you able to play sounds in A:M on your machine?

Obviously you own A:M. I should have asked if you can run A:M on the machine you are trying to run WebHAMR on. The system requirements for WebHAMR are essentially the same as those for A:M.

Ken Chaffin- Hash, Inc.

Yea sound is ok in AM and I got the sound ok in hamer for the baer and the orniment ,its strange I have a pop up blocker and it asked me to let in the one that Will put up but the ones from the hamer site ,it didn't ask ,could it be that ?its SUPPER ADD BLOCKER

For some reason those .html files want to download as .php files...what are .php files?

Edit...OK! got one to work, locally.Now I see that it isn't seeing my decals...so I guess they got left out of the zipping process...
Plays nice and smooth tho! We'll see how/if the playrate changes once the decals are online...
Then...I'm going to see about some interactivity! Bwa-HA!

Does Jonathon Darkly know about this thing?

Me again...here all alone on a Sunday with too much coffee...this HAMR really gets the wheels turning on possible uses. I came up with a big WHAT IF...

Flash-interactive movies can be published and housed within the Quicktime format-right?...A:M can import the Quicktime Format but interactivity wold be lost upon renderring- but HAMR doesn't render- it uses all the source images in realtime...right?

So---WHAT IF you could place Flash-interactive content into the 3D HAMR environment?

I've got LOTS of other things going in my nog-
Another thing--- this HAMR would be ideal for interactive walk-thru's right? But not if the wandering camera easily passes thru walls... would a 'surface constraint' keep the camera on pre-designated safe pathways? Would we be able to disable the 2-4-6-8 keys that allow for orthographic side views? Could the camera be moved with the arrow keys?

This utility has lots of potential. HAMR needs a logo.

Ah, I see...
Thanks for that information!

*Fuchur*



Yeah... I though of exactly that today...
What would be really nice would be, if you could for example make a path in the chereography and constraint the camera to it...
Than you could use the arrow-keys to follow the patch like you want. That would be nice for walkthroughs etc.

*Fuchur*

OK---I see thru further testing that QuickTime is NOT supported by HAMR io. Is that in the plans or is QT impossible...?

John,

Could you try this out and see if QT mov decals play in WebHAMR. We think it should. At one time there was a problem with the mov.iio plugin and HAMR but that seems to be resolved. in this latest release we included mov.iio with WebHAMR, but probably not with HAMRViewer. So, we think you should be able to use this in WebHAMR. Let me know.

Ken Chaffin- Hash, Inc.

No, can't get quicktimes past the error message below...

Your question is confusing to me, you say you fixxed the mov.iio (whatever that is) for the WebHAMR, but you may not have for the HAMRViewer...so...if I can't see it in the viewer, how else would I be able to see it?

Check me if I'm wrong here on these fundamental assumptions:
WebHAMR is the general technology, that can be setup, published and controlled within A:M version 13.0h or newer. HAMRViewer, is the free 5mb Internet Explorer viewer utility that allows viewing of the .zip files within .html files with playback controls and interactivity. Right?

I'm also getting the other error message before movies open...and how can I trigger an 'autoplay' so the files begin as soon as opened...

John,
No, that's not quite right. HAMR is the technology and HAMRViewer and WebHAMR are both built on top of HAMR technology. HAMRViewer is a stand alone application that runs independently from Internet Explorer. WebHAMR is the Internet Explorer plugin. These are distributed by two different downloaders and installers, but Will did put links to both in his release announcement here on the forum. The MOV.iio is the A:M plugin that is required to handle QT mov files. We released this file with WebHAMR but not with HAMRViewer. So, which one are you using? The symptoms lead me to think you are using HAMRViewer. Let me know which one you are trying to use.

Ken Chaffin- Hash, Inc.

The HAMRViewer installer was updated to include the mov.iio as well, but I can't remember when it was updated, feel free to d/l again, or just copy the mov.iio from your WebHAMR folder.

I have been using the WebHAMR within Internet Explorer calling-up local files. I had forgotten about the standalone viewer, but will go install it now and try again, as per Will's advice.

OK-
The standalone viewer (HAMRViewer) did indeed show the QuickTime movie, but UNfortunately did not play it past frame 1...(?)

I had just dragged the movie into my chor as a layer, but the fact that it showed 1 frame makes me think it should work that way.

John,

We had some confusion on our end also. The bottom line is that as of right now, both the WebHAMR and HAMRViewer installers will install the MOV.iio plugin.

A quick question. When you are modelling in A:M and setting up the QT layer, are you able to "play" the movie in the realtime A:M chor modelling/editting mode? If the movie plays in A:M chor edit play mode, we think it should play in WebHAMR or HAMRViewer.

Ken Chaffin

I hate to be such a nay-sayer...

Yes, the QT plays in my chor... all I see in the HAMRVeiwer is frame 1. I know what your saying...it's all the same hardware.

However, I didn't play with the realtime subdivisions settings... I'll get back!

John,

This morning I built an A:M test project with a MOV chor layer and verified that only the first MOV frame is being played in WebHAMR . I'll have to dig into this to see why the other frames are not playing.

Ken Chaffin- Hash, Inc.

this is monumental news! this makes surviving a long weekend in toronto and (more impressively) a new york customs officer all worth while.

now i have to get my hands on v13 while i'm still struggling with the newfangled interface.

tally ho!
-jon

This 'could' be good news...! It may be proof that my 'crack-pot-theory' about Flash content working inside QT content within WebHAMR may hold water. Or in MY case...BEER! It would seem that nothing is telling QT to play, and since it's window is not there to provide a play button... hmmmrmm...

I'm glad to see that Jon made it! That guy can do some 'stuff' with this technology! I'm not too sure he'll still be able to though, after this alleged 'NY Customs' story. We're gonna need details on this one.

I succeeded in embedding the Web Hamr viewer in a PowerPoint 2000 presentation yesterday using this free plugin for powerpoint
http://skp.mvps.org/liveweb.htm

It works great, but what if I wanted to distribute the PowerPoint on a CD? How would I know what drive letter the end user's CD/DVD drive is?

Is there any possibility that a future release of the Web Viewer will allow us to use relative paths in the HTML file?

I think this should be possible via Javascript. There is a js object named document.URL that is a string representing the URL (or local path) to the HTML file that has the js embedded in it. I think we should be able to strip the html file name off of the end of this string and then call the load in this manner:

var path=document.URL
// then strip the html file name from the path
CWebHAMRCtrl.LoadModel(path+"files.zip")

It will take me a while to figure out how to strip the filename off of the URL string. If anyone already knows how to do this in Javascript, let us hear about it.

Ken Chaffin- Hash, Inc

What about just using the document.name AND document.path elements? The document.path doesn't have the name... the document.name doesn't have the path.

I am pretty sure I have used this a few times.... I will try to hunt it down but I bet someone with more JS experience will beat me to it.

-vern

I tried document.path and document.name but neither one of those return anything. I'm not sure if it is some MS IE JS issue or what.

Ken Chaffin- Hash, Inc.

Yes... this doesn't work.

But this does!



(I was using document.write for testing.)

-vern

I got the relative path Javascript to work with the following:
******************************************
path=document.URL
if (path.indexOf("http:")!=-1)
{
endofpath=path.lastIndexOf("/")+1
path=path.slice(0,endofpath)
}
else
{
path=location.pathname
endofpath=path.lastIndexOf("\\")+1
path=path.slice(1,endofpath)
}

CWebHAMRCtrl.LoadModel(path+"files.zip")
******************************************
Since the path string looks different depending on whether the html file is hosted on a web page or on a local drive, I had to put in a test to see what kind it is and then create the short path accordingly. Thanks to HeyVern for getting me going in the right direction on this.

Ken Chaffin- Hash, Inc.

Don't forget however that Mac and PC use different "path" structures... this may work on PC but it won't work on Mac... local files on Mac in a browser use:

file:///harddrive/folder/folder/blah-blah-blah

Just a heads up.

Could do another "elseif" to check for that.

EDIT:

Oops! No one on mac would be doing this for a while anyway... hee hee....

-vern